Pervasive authentication domains for automatic pervasive device authorization

In a pervasive computing environment, users have many devices that are used to initiate or answer remote service requests, such as obtaining real-time stock quotes, handling corporate e-mail, or accepting telephone calls. We envision that in the future, many applications will be distributed, running across many of a user\´s specialized pervasive devices rather than on a single system. In this case, a user needs the ability to "log into" the personal pervasive domain which spans each of the pervasive devices representing this user. In addition, the pervasive devices belonging to the user\´s pervasive domain must be able to represent this user to external services. We solve the problem of managing the authorization for pervasive devices belonging to a user\´s personal pervasive domain by introducing a central personal authorization gateway that accompanies the user and allows pervasive devices in the user\´s pervasive domain to be automatically configured and authorized.